Not applicable.
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Not applicable.
1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to a system and method for creating switched virtual circuits that will not lose time sensitive and order sensitive information during transmission.
2. Discussion of Related Art
It is known in the art that a transport network utilizing Asynchronous Transfer Mode (ATM) technology is an excellent vehicle for transferring information, via ATM cells, for a service where the arrival of the information at the terminating end is not time sensitive. For services such as voice and video, it is essential that the ATM cells arrive at the terminating end at specific times and in the proper order. One way of providing this capability is by creating switched virtual circuits between the switching entities on the ATM network. However, prior ways of creating switched virtual circuits has led to the loss of one or more cells during a transmission of cells. The loss of cells are lost in the switching fabric because of collisions when more than one cell attempts to exit on the same pipe at the same time. Since the cells are sent at random at the originating point, these collisions can occur quite frequently.
One aspect of the present invention regards a system for creating a switched virtual circuit that includes a switch that receives initial information and a connection management system that is electrically connected to the switch, wherein the switch sends a signal to the connection management system that contains information as to the proper connection for the initial information and wherein the connection management system creates a virtual circuit that will reconfigure and transmit the initial information in such a manner that no information is lost when the initial information is transmitted by the virtual circuit.
A second aspect of the present invention regards an Asynchronous Transfer Mode (ATM) network that includes a switch that receives initial information that is in the form of one or more cells of information, wherein each cell comprises n number of bytes of information and a connection management system that is electrically connected to the switch, wherein the switch sends a signal to the connection management system that contains information as to the proper connection for the initial information and wherein the connection management system creates a virtual circuit based on the total number of cells necessary to meet the transfer rate of a call transmitting the initial information.
A third aspect of the present invention regards a method for creating a switched virtual circuit for information contained within a cell received from an initial virtual connection. The method includes the steps of determining the number n bytes of information contained within the cell and defining a megaframe of time to transmit the information, wherein the megaframe has a period T=n*p, where p is a predetermined period of time. The method further includes the steps of determining the number of cells C contained within the initial virtual connection, channelizing the initial virtual connection into C*n channels and transmitting the channelized information to a connection.
Each aspect of the present invention provides the advantage of creating a switched virtual circuit that will not only meet the arrival time and order requirements but will also insure that no cells are lost during the transmission.
Each aspect of the present invention provides the advantage of enhancing the management of an ATM network in that by assigning each cell a specific channel it is easier to know when more cells can be accepted into the network.
The foregoing features and advantages of the present invention will be further understood upon consideration of the following detailed description of the invention taken in conjunction with the accompanying drawings, in which: